Chapter 182: Different Thoughts
Chapter 182: Different Thoughts
After the sorrowful funeral, life still had to continue. Shelby’s son, little Jackson, grew up day by day under everyone’s love and care. Meanwhile, the pregnant Annelle told Shelby’s mother, M’Lynn, that after her child was born, regardless of whether it was a boy or girl, she hoped to name the child “Shelby” in memory of that resilient yet ill-fated young woman. M’Lynn tearfully agreed.
Another Easter arrived. In the vibrant countryside of spring, during a joyful picnic gathering, the heavily pregnant Annelle suddenly felt intense abdominal pain. Everyone hurriedly helped her into an off-road vehicle. The vehicle drove through the crowd, through the streets, across bridges. Amid the melodious sound of a harmonica, the scene froze upon a river hidden beneath lush green trees.
The credits slowly rose…
“Tomorrow is another day,” Elisabeth Murdoch, seated behind Julia, could not help murmuring the famous closing line from Gone with the Wind.
Although the life experiences of the women in Steel Magnolias were far less dramatic than the decades of turbulent joy and sorrow experienced by Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the Wind, and although the women in Steel Magnolias never once erupted into intense emotional outbursts—with even their deepest emotions only overflowing silently through tears—the feelings contained within that plain, fragmented life were not any less profound than the hardships Scarlett experienced against the backdrop of a chaotic era. The jeep gradually disappearing into the distance symbolized hope—the hope of the future.
When the lights came back on, no one took the lead, yet everyone in the screening room spontaneously began applauding.
“Julia, this film was truly wonderful. I think Shelby was even richer and more memorable than Vivian in Pretty Woman,” Elisabeth said sincerely while applauding, leaning close to Julia’s ear.
“Thank you, this… Miss?” Julia lightly clapped her hands as she once again sized up the beautiful young woman beside her under the lights.
Only then did Elisabeth remember that she still had not introduced herself. She quickly extended a hand. “Sorry, Julia. I’m Elisabeth Murdoch. You can call me Liz.”
“Hello, Liz,” Julia politely shook her hand. Her expression barely changed. Clearly, Julia had no idea what the surname Murdoch represented.
Elisabeth did not mind and continued softly, “Julia, why did you say earlier that Eric Williams is a bastard?”
“Ah! I… what I said earlier wasn’t directed at Mr. Wi… Williams at all. It was just a coincidence. Mr. Williams is a very good person. Without him, I’d still just be an unknown little actress right now.” Julia tried her best to appear calm, but her flickering gaze thoroughly betrayed her.
A faintly amused smile curved at the corners of Elisabeth’s lips, but she did not continue pressing the embarrassing subject. “Julia, could you tell me a little about Eric Williams? I’m planning to use the reasons behind the success of his films as the subject of my graduation thesis.”
“Liz, maybe you should ask him personally about that kind of thing. I don’t actually know that much,” Julia said. Although she had not realized Elisabeth’s family background from her surname, she had gathered from the woman’s words that Elisabeth did not seem especially close to Eric. Combined with Elisabeth’s cheerful and familiar personality, Julia gradually lowered her guard around her.
“It’s fine. Just tell me whatever you know…” Sensing the subtle shift in Julia’s attitude toward her, Elisabeth pressed forward and began asking about the topics that interested her.
At the same time, the executives from the seven major film companies who had finished watching Steel Magnolias were all harboring different thoughts.
Although Michael Eisner immediately expressed praise to Eric after the film ended, most of it was merely courtesy. Deep down, he was somewhat dismissive.
Steel Magnolias was simply too plain and uneventful. Although it had many highlights, the plot itself had almost no dramatic peaks or turns and completely failed to suit his taste. As the former right-hand man of Barry Diller, the creator of the “high-concept film” theory, Michael Eisner had personally witnessed Paramount’s rise under that philosophy step by step while working beneath Diller. Naturally, he became a loyal believer in the “high-concept film” theory himself. The rapid rise of Disney under Eisner’s leadership was closely tied to his insistence on this filmmaking philosophy.
And Steel Magnolias had absolutely nothing to do with high-concept films. If compared to literary genres, high-concept films were like highly entertaining novels, while Steel Magnolias resembled an elegant prose essay. Herbert Ross, with over twenty years of filmmaking experience, was undoubtedly a master of this kind of “prose,” but such subject matter was also destined not to have too large a market.
Although he was not optimistic about the film, that did not affect Michael Eisner’s determination to secure its distribution rights. Otherwise, he would not have personally come here today. The reason was simple: this was a film Eric Williams had confidence in. Considering the astonishing success of Eric’s previous films, that reason alone was enough.
Seated on Eric’s other side, Paramount president Ned Tanen held an evaluation similar to Michael Eisner’s. However, during the intermission after the film ended, the old man constantly tried probing Eric for information, hoping to hear Eric’s concrete expectations for the film’s box office performance so Paramount could formulate a relatively accurate profit-sharing offer.
Five years after Barry Diller’s departure, Paramount’s performance had already begun to decline noticeably. Although Indiana Jones achieved astonishing box office results with over 200 million dollars domestically and more than 400 million worldwide, because of the dominance of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg, Paramount’s share of the profits was actually lower than the dividend Columbia had received from Home Alone after being trapped by the gambling contract. Therefore, Paramount attached great importance to Eric’s two films. If Paramount’s current CEO Frank Mancuso had not truly been unable to free up time, the person attending today would definitely have been him rather than second-in-command Ned Tanen.
Although he did not think highly of Steel Magnolias, this was still a film Eric Williams favored. Among all the films Eric had participated in so far, not one had earned less than 100 million dollars at the box office.
After finishing the film, based on his professional experience and taking into account the box office appeal of Julia, Sally Field, and Shirley MacLaine, along with scheduling considerations, Ned Tanen quickly estimated the film’s box office at around 30 to 50 million dollars. Although Julia had already built considerable worldwide box office appeal through Pretty Woman, Ned Tanen had little expectation for the film’s overseas performance. The movie carried far too strong an American Southern local flavor. If the worldwide box office could reach 30 million dollars, that alone would already count as a small miracle.
If things truly turned out as he estimated, after deducting production and distribution costs, the film would at most earn around 10 million dollars in profit—a figure insignificant compared to the profits of Eric’s other films.
Ned Tanen believed Eric would not stir up such a huge commotion merely for a mere 10 million dollars in profit. Yet no matter how indirectly he probed Eric for information, the young man before him always responded with vague, all-purpose answers, maintaining an attitude of “judge for yourselves.”
In truth, the reason Eric refused to reveal his own assessment was mainly caution. Although he was very optimistic about the film, he could not be one hundred percent certain about exactly how much box office it would earn. In his mind, the North American box office should be around 100 million dollars. After all, in his previous life, the film had earned over 80 million dollars even before Julia filmed Pretty Woman. Now, no matter what, Julia alone should be able to bring an additional 20 million dollars in box office appeal.
But this estimate absolutely could not be stated openly. Once spoken aloud, if the eventual box office failed to meet expectations like it had in his previous life, Eric would essentially be smashing his own reputation. If he said nothing, however, there would be no issue at all. Even if the film failed to become a major hit like before, it would have little to do with Eric. Firefly was merely the investor, and aside from placing Julia into the cast, Eric had not interfered with anything else.
Seated one spot away from Eric, Amy Pascal could be said to be the person among the seven representatives who liked the film the most. Amy Pascal was a typical feminist and therefore particularly fond of female-centered films. In his previous life, she had supported a whole series of women-focused movies, the most famous being the Charlie's Angels series. Coupled with the emotional sensitivity inherent in women, she was completely captivated by the joys and sorrows of the women in the film. She even had the sudden urge to take a vacation immediately and spend a period living a peaceful, ordinary life in a Southern small town.
However, Amy Pascal also knew that she and Fox representative Carta Hunt were destined merely to go through the motions today. Fox already possessed the distribution rights to two of Eric’s films for the end of the year, and from the perspective of marketing resource allocation, Firefly would certainly not hand additional films to Fox. Meanwhile, Columbia was about to finalize its agreement with the Japanese, and no one could predict the Japanese management strategy afterward. To avoid risks, Firefly definitely would not allow Columbia to handle distribution either.
Among the representatives of the seven major film companies, Warner’s representative was the calmest. Warner’s performance this year had been excellent across the board. Although Warner would never refuse money, they would only offer what they considered an appropriate profit-sharing figure. If they won the bid, that would be fortunate. If they failed, they would not feel particularly regretful.
Universal was caught in internal turmoil, with two leaders battling back and forth, leaving them with little interest in fighting for distribution rights. MGM, meanwhile, had already been utterly wrecked by that Las Vegas tycoon Kirk Kerkorian. Kirk only paid attention to MGM’s business performance when he wanted to sell the company again for cash at a better price. Thus MGM’s executives had the will to save the situation but lacked the power to reverse it. The MGM representative seated in the front row chatted enthusiastically with Warner’s executive, and from his words, he even seemed to be considering jumping ship.